View source for Sixteenth note

{{Short description|Musical note duration}}
{{redirect|♬|the general meaning of the symbol|Musical note}}
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[[image:Sixteenth notes and rest.png|thumb|right|'''Figure 1.''' A 16th note with stem facing up, a 16th note with stem facing down, and a 16th rest.]]
[[image:Sixteenth note run.svg|thumb|right|'''Figure 2.''' Four 16th notes beamed together.]]
{{Duple note values}}
{{Duple note values audio}}

In [[music]], a '''1/16, sixteenth note'''<!-- '16th note' is wrong; it's a fraction not an ordinal --> ([[American English|American]]) or '''semiquaver''' ([[British English|British]]) is a [[Musical note|note]] played for half the duration of an [[eighth note]] (quaver), hence the names. It is the equivalent of the semifusa in [[mensural notation]], first found in 15th-century notation.{{r|GroveDict2001_Semiquaver}}

Sixteenth notes are notated with an oval, filled-in [[note head]] and a straight [[note stem]] with two [[flag (note)|flag]]s (see Figure 1). A single sixteenth note is always stemmed with flags, while two or more are usually beamed in groups.{{r|Gerou1996_211}} A corresponding symbol is the '''sixteenth rest''' (or '''semiquaver rest'''), which denotes a silence for the same duration. As with all notes with stems, sixteenth notes are drawn with stems to the right of the notehead, facing up, when they are below the middle line of the [[musical staff]] (or on the middle line, in vocal music). When they are on the middle line (in instrumental music) or above it, they are drawn with stems on the left of the note head, facing down. Flags are always on the right side of the stem, and curve to the right. On stems facing up, the flags start at the top and curve down; for downward facing stems, the flags start at the bottom of the stem and curve up. When multiple sixteenth notes or eighth notes (or thirty-second notes, etc.) are next to each other, the flags may be connected with a [[Beam (music)|beam]], like the notes in Figure 2. Note the similarities in notating sixteenth notes and [[eighth note]]s. Similar rules apply to smaller divisions such as [[thirty-second note]]s (demisemiquavers) and [[sixty-fourth note]]s (hemidemisemiquavers).

In [[Unicode]], U+266C (♬) is a pair of beamed semiquavers.

The note derives from the ''semifusa'' in [[mensural notation]]. However, ''semifusa'' also designates the modern sixty-fourth note in Spanish, Catalan and Portuguese.
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==See also==
* [[List of musical symbols]]

==References==
{{reflist|refs=
<ref name=GroveDict2001_Semiquaver>{{cite book |last1=Morehen |first1=John |last2=Rastall |first2=Richard |date=2001 |chapter=Semiquaver |editor1-last=Sadie |editor1-first=Stanley |editor1-link=Stanley Sadie |editor2-last=Tyrrell |editor2-first=John |editor2-link=John Tyrrell (professor of music) |title=[[The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians]] |edition=2nd |location=London |publisher=Macmillan |isbn=9780195170672}}</ref>

<ref name=Gerou1996_211>{{cite book |last=Gerou |first=Tom |date=1996 |title=Essential Dictionary of Music Notation |publisher=Alfred |page=211 |isbn=9780882847306}}</ref>
}}

{{Musical note values}}

[[Category:Note values]]